HP to Ship SQL Server-Based Consolidation Appliance

Posted on October 15, 2011 By Stuart J. Johnston

HP and Microsoft announced at the software giant's SQL Server conference in Seattle this week that the hardware maker will ship next month an appliance meant to simplify enterprise database server consolidation.

The announcement came on the second day of PASS Summit 2011, when Quentin Clark, corporate vice president of Microsoft's SQL Server Database Systems Group, told attendees that HP (NYSE: HPQ ) will release the HP Enterprise Database Consolidation Appliance optimized for SQL Server in November.

The announcement came a day after Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) revealed it will ship SQL Server "Denali" -- now renamed SQL Server 2012 -- in the first half of next year.

The appliance will provide a complete solution for simplifying management of as well as speeding deployment of thousands of databases in a private cloud environment, Clark said during his keynote speech.

"It will help customers deploy databases in minutes instead of weeks and reduces operations costs up to 75 percent," a Microsoft spokesperson said in an email to InternetNews.com. In a blog post, the company quantified those savings as being in floor space, energy, and infrastructure, and added that it requires no application or database changes when consolidating databases.

HP's appliance runs Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2.

Additionally, Clark emphasized that SQL Server 2012 and Microsoft's SQL Azure public cloud database will be able to interoperate.

"Built from the same code base, SQL Server 2012 and SQL Azure provide a complete database solution for the enterprise," Clark said in a statement.

The next SQL Azure service release is slated for delivery by the end of 2011.

Microsoft also announced the immediate availability of community technology previews (CTP) of SQL Azure Reporting for creating operational reports, and of SQL Azure Data Sync for sharing and synchronizing SQL Server and SQL Azure databases.

In addition, SQL Server 2012 will be able to back databases up to SQL Azure in the cloud, company officials said.

Stuart J. Johnston is a contributing editor at InternetNews.com, the news service of Internet.com, the network for technology professionals. Follow him on Twitter @stuartj1000.

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